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Ridge makes products designed to last. That creates an unusual growth problem: happy customers have little reason to buy another wallet.
Its answer was not to launch everything at once. Ridge built a repeatable system for testing new categories, absorbing failed experiments and backing the few that could create demand of their own.
Today:
We break down how Ridge expands without losing focus, show you how to find where visitors stop scrolling, share three important ecommerce updates and give you one account-security Growth Rep.
Today’s issue is presented by Brevo’s List Tax Calculator, which shows how much you may be paying to store contacts you rarely email.
Today’s Deep Dive
How Ridge Tests New Categories Without Losing Focus
Ridge has a strange growth problem: it makes products that last.
CEO Sean Frank says roughly 99% of its wallet customers never buy another wallet. Even happy customers have little reason to return.
That is why Ridge now sells rings, luggage, phone cases, chargers, knives and more. But this is not a lesson about launching more products as quickly as possible.
Ridge expanded after its core product and acquisition engine were already working.
Ridge began with wallets. Its catalogue now spans several accessory categories.
First, earn the right to expand
Ridge spent years proving it could sell wallets profitably. It built demand, brand recognition and a repeatable advertising engine before low repeat purchasing became the constraint.
If your core product is still struggling, expanding the catalogue usually spreads the problem across more inventory.
Expansion makes sense when the core works, but the category cannot carry the next stage of growth.
Then, budget to be wrong
Frank says Ridge dedicates roughly $1 million each year to trying new products.
Some tests failed. Customers did not want Ridge watches, T-shirts or socks. Rings went in the opposite direction and became an eight-figure business.
Rings grew from an experiment into an eight-figure category.
The advantage is not that Ridge always predicts correctly. It has a system that makes being wrong affordable.
Each winner must create its own demand
A strong category does more than give wallet customers another item to buy.
Luggage reaches someone preparing for a trip. Rings reach someone getting married. Tech accessories reach someone buying around a new device.
Each creates a new reason to enter Ridge. Any later cross-sell is additional upside.
Travel gives Ridge access to a buying occasion wallets cannot reach.
Test before committing
Ridge’s recommendation is simple: create the concept and renders, build a landing page, and run traffic before making a large inventory commitment.
Use a clearly labelled waitlist or preorder to measure demand. If the numbers are weak, stop. If customers respond, invest.
What to copy
Before testing a new category, ask:
Is the core already working? If not, stay focused.
Has the core reached a real constraint? Look for low repeat purchasing, audience saturation or a limited category.
Can the new category attract demand on its own? It should create a new customer or buying occasion.
How much can you afford to lose learning? Set the budget before the test begins.
Focus until the core works. Then use controlled experiments to find the category that can carry the next stage of growth.
Presented by Brevo
What a 25,000-contact store actually pays for email
Here's a side-by-side using published pricing. Take a store with 25,000 contacts sending 40,000 emails a month - about four emails to each engaged subscriber.
On Klaviyo, which bills on active profiles stored, that store pays $400 a month.
On Brevo, which bills on emails sent, the same list and the same sends cost $46 a month.
That's $354 a month, or $4,248 a year, for exactly the same sending.
Where does the gap come from? At four emails each, 40,000 sends reach about 10,000 people. The other 15,000 are ghost contacts - profiles you pay to store but rarely email. On contact-based pricing, those ghosts cost this store roughly $3,000 a year on their own. That's the List Tax: money spent on storage, not sales.
And it keeps growing. Every popup signup and every one-time buyer adds to the bill, whether you email them again or not.
Enter your own contact count and monthly sends in the List Tax Calculator to see your version of this breakdown. Spending $1,000+ a month on Klaviyo? Share an invoice and get 50% off Brevo for your first three months.
See your breakdown
The How-To
How to See Where Visitors Stop Scrolling
A strong section cannot persuade someone who never reaches it.
Microsoft Clarity’s Scroll maps show what percentage of visitors reach each part of a page. Use them to check whether customers see your reviews, product benefits, guarantees and calls to action.
Step 1: Open the page’s heatmap
In Microsoft Clarity, select Heatmaps.
Find the product or landing page you want to inspect.
Select View Heatmap.
Switch the heatmap type to Scroll.
Step 2: Separate mobile and desktop
Under Supported devices, select Mobile. Choose your time frame and confirm the correct page under Visited URL.
Do not combine devices. Their folds and page lengths are different.
Step 3: Find the drop-off point
Move down the page inside the map. Clarity shows the percentage of visitors reaching each depth, the number of visitors, the drop-off percentage and the average fold.
Hover over any section to see the exact percentage of visitors who reached it. You can also jump to the 25%, 50% and 75% depth markers.
Source: Microsoft Clarity
Step 4: Check what customers missed
Look immediately below the sharpest drop.
If most visitors leave before reaching an important review, comparison, guarantee or CTA, move it higher, shorten the content above it or add an earlier version of the CTA.
Repeat the check on desktop.
A drop in scrolling is normal. The problem is when the information needed to make the purchase appears after most visitors have left.
P.S. If you have not installed Clarity yet, create a free project and go to Settings → Setup. Choose your platform or copy the tracking code into your website’s <head>. Clarity begins collecting data once the code is live. Follow Microsoft’s setup guide.
While You Were Building
In the Headlines
AI agents can now read and update a Shopify checkout, then place the order after the shopper confirms. There is nothing for merchants to install, but accurate product data now matters beyond the product page.
Merchants using Amazon Multichannel Fulfillment can add Prime delivery to their own websites without making shoppers log in to Amazon. Brands using MCF should test whether the Prime badge lifts first-order conversion.
Eligible advertisers will soon be able to bid for prominent placement when shoppers search with images or inspect Pins. Product-led brands should prepare clean catalogue images and test the beta when access appears.
On Socials
The important shift is not a better chatbot. It is AI that stays on the job. Ecommerce teams should start turning recurring work with clear rules and checkpoints into ongoing assignments, instead of starting every task with a new prompt.
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🔐 Today’s Growth Rep: Remove One Unneeded Account Access
Find one former employee, freelancer or agency that can still access a business-critical tool and remove them today.
Why this works:
Old accounts create avoidable security and data risks.
Shared logins make it difficult to know who changed what.
Regular access reviews keep permissions aligned with current responsibilities.
Your rep:
Check users in Shopify, Meta, Google, your email platform and shared drive.
Remove one person who no longer needs access.
Reduce admin access for anyone who only needs a narrower role.
Turn on two-factor authentication where it is missing.
Report: “One unnecessary access removed.”
People should have the access their current job requires, and nothing more.